Majesty: The Fantasy Kingdom Sim

aka: King of Ardania: Madō ōkoku no yoake, Majesty: Realm of Arcania, Majesty: Sovereign of Ardania, Majesty: Władca Ardanii
Moby ID: 1277
Windows Specs

Description official descriptions

Majesty: The Fantasy Kingdom Sim is a real-time strategy game which, unlike other games in the genre, does not have the player directly control his units. Instead, all "heroes" are recruited from their respective guilds and as of that moment, their will is their own.

The player, the eponymous "majesty", can direct heroes by placing bounties on areas and specific enemies to motivate heroes. Some heroes like rangers are more keen on exploration, while rogues believe in the rule of gold. All heroes level up with combat experience, thereby increasing their statistics. Wizard's towers and certain temples allow the player to cast certain spells independently from spell-casting heroes. Some guilds and temples are mutually exclusive, and can not be present on the map under the player's ownership at the same time due to their respective heroes' rivalries. The only resource in the game is gold, and is gathered through tax collectors who patrol the player's buildings, through heroes' purchases in buildings such as marketplaces and blacksmiths, and by discovering treasure chests on the map.

The storyline follows the player as the new king of the fantasy kingdom of Ardania in the quest to reunite the once large state and reclaim it from monsters and evildoers. Missions range from the typical seek-and-destroy type to rescuing certain characters, and there is a random map generator available in single- and multiplayer in which tasks, map types and monster strength can be set at will. The main singleplayer campaign is split to regions, and the final mission of each region requires all prior relevant missions to be completed first. The final mission can only be accessed by finishing the entire rest of the campaign.

Spellings

  • 王权:幻想王国 - Simplified Chinese spelling

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Credits (Windows version)

129 People (111 developers, 18 thanks) · View all

Reviews

Critics

Average score: 75% (based on 39 ratings)

Players

Average score: 3.8 out of 5 (based on 43 ratings with 4 reviews)

A newbie strategy effort: Not recommended for veteran strategists

The Good
Well, is a new approach, I can tell you that. Interesting new classes introduced, lots of funny little people walking around.

The "god-like" ability, is probably more or less the role you play. You can assist your hired heroes, better said mercenaries, in combat - indirectly. Since you cannot control your heroes, but you can heal them or zap your enemy (or even your own heroes) with a lighting bolt.

The real-time strategy demands fast thinking, fast defence and offence, especially the hardest levels. You don't want to have a bunch of dragons attacking your town when your mucking around in the local tavern.

The Bad
Seriously, I consider this a game a mistake. Why?

Well, for a perfective strategist like myself (ehem), you'd like to have make your town in a certain way so it can at least defend itself. Unfortunately the building sim is so bad in this game, you can only build buildings so close to each other, that your considering the space available than the layout itself. This also applys for your defensive structures (towers).

A strategy game with a bad building layout. Isn't that supposed to be the "core" of a strategy game (sigh).

So you can't control your heroes. I can live with that on certain levels of challenge. But I consider this game rather bad in a MORAL kind of sense. The only way you can get your heroes to actually do something for you is if you "bribe" them, that is offer a reward.

What happened to heroes with honor. I didn't know paladins are bounty hunters, and in this game, paladins love money. Bad morals people, bad morals. Let's get capitalist approaches out of these games shall we. It bad for the children. You don't want games like this to teach your kids.

The Bottom Line
As I said above - Not recommended for veteran strategists. Oh, and especially not recommended for children. A paladin bounty hunter (sigh), what is this world coming to...

Overall grade: C-

But if your extreamly bored, it better than playing solitare...

Windows · by Indra was here (20760) · 2002

A charming game.

The Good
This game was straight forward to play and combined a rather interesting blend of role-playing with an RTS format. I also rather enjoyed the lack of resource harvesting. This left more time for actually building up areas and coercing your heroes into fighting where you needed them. This game was unique to me in that you can not order your heroes around, but merely place rewards for them to collect and cross you fingers and hope they follow your desires.

The Bad
Not enough missions. Of course I never tried this game in multiplayer mode, so not having more than 15 missions or so meant the game didn't take more than a few weeks to play and had very little replay value after that period.

The Bottom Line
A rather interesting blend of role-playing with an RTS format in which you have no direct control over your unit.

Windows · by Jeff Watts (18) · 2001

A Simple, Fun Game

The Good
I liked the easy learning curve of this game. Graphics are pretty nice as is the sound. The tax collector's happily saying, "More gold you majesty" makes one feel like quite the "tax-and-spend" politician. grin It's just a fun game on the whole.

The Bad
I didn't like not having control over the different "heroes" you recruit. They basically go wherever they feel like in your town or countryside which is bad when you are under attack and don't have a lot of gold to "Recall" your knights.

The "Mage Towers" used for defense of your city cost money to activate. Fine. But there should have been an option to keep them active (subtracting additional monies if required).


The Bottom Line
Basically this is a simple strategy game that is a lot of fun.

Windows · by AstroNerdBoy (35) · 2002

[ View all 4 player reviews ]

Trivia

Extras

The box contains 3rd edition Dungeons & Dragons pen and paper RPG rules as well as a summer sneak peek book of Wizards of the Coast's book line-up.

Online servers

The game's online servers which were hosted on GameSpy were scheduled to shut down on 31 May 2014 in the wake of GameSpy's total closure.

Awards

  • Computer Gaming World
    • April 2001 (Issue #201) – Pleasant Surprise of the Year

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Related Games

Majesty: The Fantasy Kingdom Sim - Gold Edition
Released 2002 on Windows, Linux
Majesty 2: Kingmaker
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Majesty 2: Battles of Ardania
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The Majesty of Colors
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The Lands of Zador
Released 2016 on Commodore 16, Plus/4
G.H.O.S.T. Hunters: The Haunting of Majesty Manor
Released 2007 on Windows, Macintosh, 2013 on iPhone
Majesty 2: The Fantasy Kingdom Sim
Released 2009 on Windows, 2010 on Macintosh
Majesty: The Fantasy Kingdom Sim (Demo Version)
Released 1999 on Windows, 2000 on Macintosh

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  • MobyGames ID: 1277
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Contributors to this Entry

Game added by Jonathon Howard.

Macintosh added by Terok Nor.

Additional contributors: Kasey Chang, Unicorn Lynx, paul cairey, Kabushi, Cantillon, Patrick Bregger, Karsa Orlong, Plok.

Game added April 5, 2000. Last modified March 14, 2024.